Skeleton Stories

by Delondra Williams

Run Time: 2 hrs 30 mins

Cast Size: 7F, 5M, Flexible

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On Día de
Los Muertos (Day of the Dead), a young girl named Maya journeys into the
underworld to find and rescue the spirit of her dead mother. Through a series
of vignettes, guided by the Aztec spirit Yellow Dog, Maya encounters lost souls
and experiences their stories before confronting the god of Death…who wants to
keep Maya for his own.

Synopsis

Maya, a
young Latina girl who lives with her single father, prays a novena on Day of
the Dead, hoping to bring back the spirit of her dead mother, Corazón. When she
spontaneously begins her first period, the event sparks true magic, summoning
the death saint Santa Muerte. Santa Muerte informs Maya that her prayers have
actually cursed Corazón, and that the god of the underworld, Mitch, now keeps
her as a “pet” in a cage. Determined to save her mother, Maya trades the heart
locket her mother gave her to Santa Muerte in order to gain entry to the
underworld.

Maya falls
through the veil between the living and the dead into an underworld river,
where she meets a hyperactive and hypersexual guide named Yellow Dog. He at
first refuses to help Maya since his job is to guide the dead and she is still
alive, but she promises to give him her heart in exchange. Yellow Dog then
warns her that they will run into the souls of dead people on their journey and
that talking to them only encourages them to tell their stories. Curious, Maya
immediately strikes up a conversation with a friendly man on a raft, Chris.
Chris tells Maya about how after his wife died, she was reincarnated as a
Monarch butterfly. (“Butterfly Kiss.”)

Maya and
Yellow Dog come to the second level of the underworld, which taps into Maya’s
new apprehension about sex and her changing body. Maya is embarrassed by
mountains that look like human breasts, and Yellow Dog offers to “hold on to”
her eyes until they’ve passed through. He magically pops out Maya’s eyes and
puts them around his neck. As Maya passes blindly through the mountains, a
character named Jen tells her about the time her own dead body was found in a
river and how her tragedy paralleled that of the Mexican ghost La Llorona. (“Desert Aria.”)

Yellow Dog
then takes Maya’s nose so they can travel through a mountain of shit, where
Maya meets a wealthy woman so consumed with maintaining her lifestyle and
staying young that she murdered her own daughter. (“Buttercup.”) The daughter
in the story gives Maya a stone that she says used to be her own heart until
her mother stabbed it. She warns Maya not to give Yellow Dog her real heart, to
use the stone instead. When Yellow Dog asks what the teen girl gave Maya, Maya
lies and says nothing.

Maya and
Yellow Dog then pass through a war zone with bullets flying. Yellow Dog yanks
off Maya’s ear, and she faints. Yellow Dog moves to attack her, but a Soldier
catches him and orders him to take Maya to Mitch. The Soldier then recounts his
story of being killed during a war and then wandering as a skeleton into the
home of two party girls who had no idea their world was ending outside.
(“Boneheads.”)

Yellow Dog
carries an unconscious Maya to a ceremonial table, where she’s visited by her
own ancestors. They bring her food to eat and recount the story of her family
coming to the U.S. from Mexico on foot. But when they ask her to eat human
meat, Maya is so horrified that Yellow Dog takes her tongue, rendering her
mute. She eats the meat in order to gain access to the next level of the
underworld, but that’s when Yellow Dog demands his payment…her heart. He
attacks her, and she distracts him by giving him the little stone, then stabs
him. In a trance, she cuts out his heart and eats it, thus completing the
sacrificial ceremony. As Maya goes on alone to the final level, a woman named
Annie tells the story of being blinded and abandoned after discovering her
lover was a supernatural being. (“Annie in the Moonlight.”)

Maya comes
to Mitch’s lair, where he puts on a torturous “magic act” that is just him
hacking Corazón into pieces every night. While Corazón sews herself together,
Maya appears, and the mother and daughter reunite. Corazón admonishes Maya for
allowing Yellow Dog to take away parts of her body, and she pieces Maya back
together while explaining what it means to be a woman. Maya tells Corazón she
got her first period, and Corazón embraces her, saying Maya is always in her
heart. Mitch interrupts them, tossing Corazón aside and making Maya take her
place in the “act,” which will kill Maya. But Maya tricks Mitch into getting
into a coffin, threatening to chop off his head unless he frees Corazón. He
does, but Maya cuts off his head anyway, and a laughing Mitch says he’ll see
her again some day.

Maya is
transported back to the world of the living, where she finds her father looking
for her at a cemetery celebrating Day of the Dead. He tells Maya he found her
“heart,” the locket she gave to Santa Muerte. She asks him to fasten it back on
her, and then they hug, as Day of the Dead dancers celebrate around them.

More Info

Characters: (with suggested double casting,
though the director may combine the roles to his or her discretion; they can
also be played individually for larger casts)

Maya
-- Female. 20s to pass for teens. Hispanic. Maya is a brave but foolish girl
who ventures into the Underworld.

Yellow
Dog -- Male. Any age. A high-energy anthropomorphic dog who guides souls
through the levels of the Underworld.

Corazon
-- Female. 30+. Hispanic. Corazon is Maya's soulful dead mother and the
favorite plaything of the god of the Underworld. Has dancing ability.

Dad/Abuelo/Soldier
-- Male. 30+. Hispanic. Dad is Maya's loving, overwhelmed father. Abuelo is
Maya’s warm grandfather. Soldier is a frightened American soldier with a skull
for a face.

Santa
Muerte/Skelly/Jen -- Female. Teens. Both are skeletons. Santa Muerte is a death
saint worshipped in violent cities; she resembles the Virgin Mary with a skull
face. Skelly is an elegant but ruthless skeleton who represents Time. Jen is an
anguished teenager with long dark hair who resembles La Llorona.

Christopher/Man
-- Male. 20+. Christopher is a sad, gentle man who misses his dead wife. Man is
a sexy and mysterious nighttime visitor with wings.

Carlos/Alex/Ancestor
-- Male. 30+. Carlos is a migrant worker with a violent streak but who is also
very loving to his niece and nephew. Alex is a funny, callous but ultimately
kind friend of Christopher. Ancestor is a stoic Aztec eagle warrior.

Buttercup
Jr./Billie -- Female. Late teens to 20+. Buttercup Jr. is Buttercup's
rebellious, gothy clone. Billie is a vapid college student dressed as a sexy
witch for Halloween.

Bridie/Hayley
-- Female. 20+. Bridie is Billie's smarter but equally partygirl friend. She is
dressed as a sexy nurse for Halloween. Hayley is a heartfelt young woman with
light hair looking for her lost friend; must have singing ability.

Mitch/Jeffy/Ignacio
-- Male. 30+. Mitch is the god of the Underworld. He is a maniacal, psychotic skeleton
with dancing ability. Jeffy is Buttercup’s slick, corrupt lawyer who tries to
seduce her clone. Ignacio is a sweet migrant worker who is in love with Hayley;
plays the harmonica.

Note: Two of the plays have a Chorus that
can be as small as three or as large as six actors. Dancing ability preferred.

Setting:Present day. Day of the Dead. The settings are various, but
we always return to Los Angeles and the Underworld.

Delondra Williams grew up in eastern Washington State
and graduated from Central Washington University with a BA in Theater Arts. Her
short play Buttercup was performed at
The Kennedy Center as part of the American College Theatre Festival, and
another short, Desert Aria, was a
finalist for the Humana Play Festival. She developed these ten minutes into her
first full-length play, Skeleton Stories.
After working as a script reader at Film Independent, Kadakowa Pictures, and
the talent management agency Hofflund/Polone, Delondra wrote and co-wrote over
a dozen television movies for Lifetime, LMN, Syfy, Animal Planet and AXS,
including Rise Of The Zombies, Elvis
Lives!, Wuthering High School, Social Nightmare, Night Of The Wild, Zombie
Night, and Blood Lake: Attack Of The
Killer Lampreys. She currently works in the development department at The
Asylum production company and is a staff writer on the hit Syfy zombie show Z Nation.

Performance Royalties are based on theater particulars. Please fill out
an application for a personalized quote.

Billing responsibilities, pertinent copyright
information, and playwrights' biographies are available in the show rider that
comes with your license agreement. To download the show rider for Skeleton Stories,click here.

“A
touching, smart and also bitingly funny series of stories about death and the
world beyond… It weaves together a series of self-contained vignettes – some
tearfully touching, others macabrely hilarious – about death, loss and
acceptance… A tremendous production that includes puppetry and masks, dance,
multimedia projections, intricate soundscapes, and strong, solid performances
by its cast.” –Neon Tommy

“Delondra
Williams wrote a hysterical, poignant and highly intelligent play…an original
tour de force that should be a staple for the month of October. Williams’ play
is naturally haunting, smart, funny and taboo...” –Entertainment
Today

“Spooky!...
Chilling!... Flashes of humor in the dialogue blend well with the play’s more
ominous and violent sequences.” –LA
Weekly

“A unique
experience for the audience with its weird imagery and its tragic
storytelling.” –The American River
Current

“Filled
with symbolism both eerie and enchanting… a fascinating celebration of love,
death and the next world.” –American
River Message

“True to
the festivities that inspired it, Skeleton
Stories has captured a quintessential balance of horror, humor and sense of
life.” –Daily Bruin

Materials: your materials
will be sent to you two months prior to your opening date and will include
everything necessary for your production and can be ordered in Printed or
Digital format. Printed Materials are provided on unbound three-hole punched
loose-leaf paper while digital Materials are provided
via email as downloadable PDF files for you to print in-house. All materials
are yours to keep! No deposits, no returns.

Gallery

A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR

After attending my first Day of the Dead at Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles, I knew I wanted to write something that captured the warmth and the weight of the holiday. The short plays that make up Skeleton Stories are sometimes sweet, sometimes frightening warnings not to get stuck in one phase of life, because we are meant to keep moving forward, even when that means stepping into the unknown. I hope audiences come away feeling a sense of celebration, remembrance of their own loved ones who have passed, and an eagerness to embrace the next stage in their own lives. –Delondra Williams